10 people experiencing homelessness in Hamilton died in early 2022, doctors say; overdoses lead cause

Drug overdosesarealeading cause of deathfor people experiencing homelessness in Hamilton, according to new figures released by agroup of local healthcare providers.

The group monitoringmortality rates within the homelesspopulation within the cityfound that between December2021 andMay 2022 at least 10peopledied, out of those, eight people died of an overdose.

According to the group, seven out of the 10 werepeople staying within a shelter,nine out of 10were men. The average age at the time of their deaths was43 years.

"These people are dying very early," said Dr. Inna Berditchevskaia, a doctor of internal medicine focusing on shelter medicine and homelessness and part of the team documenting these deaths.

The team, which includesDr. Claire Bodkin and other medical residents, released the recent figures on Oct. 4. Theygave their firstreportback in January, showing that19 people experiencing homelessnesshad died in Hamilton between June and November 2021.

The grouprecentlyupdatedtheir sitewith the latest figures andasked voters to use the data to makeinformed decisions in the upcoming Oct. 24 election when it comes to the response they'd like to see tohomelessness.

"There was a needs assessment a few years back that showed that Hamilton needs more supervised and safe consumption sites and things are moving extremely slowly in terms of that," Berditchevskaiatold CBC Hamilton.

According to the Canadian Vital Statistics Death Databasepublished byStatisticsCanada, the average life expectancy of a Hamiltonian is 81 years dramatically higher than the 43 years for those living in homelessness in Hamilton, Breditchevskaiapointed out.

"It's really not a stretch to say that homelessness in and of itself kills because these people are dying just so much earlier than other Hamiltonians,"Breditchevskaia said.

The data on the group'swebsite says that substance abuseand mental illness werekey comorbid factors in homeless deaths. Comordidfactors refer tocauses and conditions that may have contributed to the person's death.

It's not a stretch to say that homelessness in and of itself kills.- Dr. Inna Breditchevskaia

According to the City of Hamilton's Housing and Homelessness Dashboard, as of August 2022, there wereover 1,400 people experiencing homelessnessin the city.

The site says the current system-wide shelter beds capacity sits at 619 beds, and over 400 peoplein the city have been homeless for longer than six months.

Berditchevskaia stressedhow alarming it is that so many of those who died wereaccessingshelter services at the time and how the city needs to increase their efforts to prevent these deaths.

Callsfor drug policyreform, safer supply of drugs

The group pointed specifically to the need to transformhousing and drug policies.

"More than anything, our data reflects the urgency with which policy makers must listen, learn, and act in order to pursue safe, supported, and permanent housing; and to radically transform Canada's drug policy to facilitate widespread access to a safe, legal, regulated drug supply," the group said ina media release.

In August, Hamilton city councillorsvotedto support a federal government initiative to decriminalize the possession of small amounts of illegal drugs.

At the time,Coun. Brad Clark said he was hopeful, if Hamilton does see thedecriminalizationof some drugs, it wouldleadto an increase in substance abuse treatment, "which is a positive thing in our community."

Berditchevskaia believes that the city needs to do more before more people die.

"The city needs to find more supervised and safe consumption sites first and foremost," she said."That's looking extremely downstream though, that's looking at the very end at what's killing these people and how can we intervene...and then the big upstream thing ispeople really need to be housed," she said.

The group's report came asthe city reportedan increased number of suspected drug-related deaths in Hamilton betweenSept.26 to October 2.

"The number of suspect drug-related deaths was eight, which is two times higher than the weekly median for the past year," the city said on its website on Oct. 7. "Paramedic response to suspected opioid overdoses were high during the same week," said the notice, citing figures from theOffice of the Chief Coroner for Ontario.

In August, onInternational Overdose Awareness Day,Olivia Mancini, co-founder of theHamilton-basedStudent Overdose Prevention and Education Network, called government's response to the opioid crisis so far "deeply inadequate," and stressedthe importance of overdose prevention and education, harm reduction, and naloxone trainingnow more than ever.

"Getting more people to carry naloxone in the community as a basic first aid responseand educating and providing people the knowledge and tools to save a life with naloxone," she said.

Mancini said she feelsthat decriminalizing drugs is too shallow a plan.

"It doesn't even address the people dying, it just ends the criminalizing of people that are using drugs,"she said."We need immediate action for a safer supply of drugs, harm reduction measures [inshelters] and more safe spaces to use drugs, like inhalation sites to smoke drugs."